Winter storm starting to hit region

Scotland Elementary School students bury their principal, Tom VanArsdale, in the snow as a reward activity for turning in the most box tops during a schoolwide competition Jan. 23, 2015, in Scotland, Pa.Other totals included 3 inches in Wales in Hampden County, 2.5 inches in Westfield, 1.8 inches in Acushnet and Southbridge, 1.6 inches in Andover, and 1.5 inches in Chicopee, Belchertown, Winthrop, and at Logan Airport in East Boston.A swift and powerful Nor’easter is expected to hammer the Big Apple this weekend — unleashing fierce rain, a blanket of snow and dangerously icy roads, city officials said. “It’s going to be a messy situation tonight and tomorrow,” said Emergency Management Commissioner Joseph Esposito, speaking Friday during a press conference at OEM headquarters. “We’re expecting between 2 to 5 inches of snow and probably some accumulation of some icing conditions,” Esposito explained. “We’re expecting some wintery mix tonight.

— Residents of several major Northeast cities are experiencing a fast-moving coastal storm that is bringing a mix of sleet, rain and snow to areas along the busy Interstate 95 corridor this weekend. The snow that began falling in southeastern Pennsylvania and West Virginia late Friday had become rain and sleet in some areas by early Saturday, and the National Weather Service said Washington, D.C., Delaware and most of Maryland had rain. Today (Saturday): The bulk of this storm is done, but it’s still spinning just off to our east during the early morning, so some impacts are likely to remain.

The bad weather will start off as snow on Friday just before midnight and will then transform into a brief period of freezing rain before sunrise, meteorologists said. Meteorologist Ed Curran of CBS Chicago station WBBM-TV reports a second storm system was forecast to come into the Great Lakes region Sunday, dumping more snow in Chicago before making its way to the East Coast by Monday morning.

Snow in those areas began early Saturday — and it could mix with freezing rain, sleet, and rain before returning to snow in the evening, forecasters said. Southern New England could get walloped with the largest amount of snowfall, but temperatures hovering near freezing could make for slippery driving conditions across the region, forecasters warned. “It’s kind of the first one, so it’s a good thing it’s happening this weekend,” weather service meteorologist Bill Simpson in Taunton, Massachusetts, said Friday of the storm. “If this happened during a weekday, it could be really slow and messy.” A winter storm warning was issued Friday for a large portion of central Pennsylvania ahead of the storm. In New York City, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority said it would be deploying superpowered snow throwers and retired subway cars modified with deicing equipment to keep bus routes and subway rails clear. Connecticut has plenty of salt and snow-treatment chemicals stockpiled around the state and a fleet of 632 plow trucks ready to go, Transportation Department spokesman Kevin Nursick said.